Friday, February 28, 2014

This has been a very hard month around here on so
many levels. As you can see below there is not much to the “February 2014 Reads
and Reviews.” If it wasn’t for
Barry and Patrick there wouldn’t be much of anything at all review wise on the
blog. Thanks again to both for their efforts.

Gracie
The Undercover Beagle and Her Sidekick Boston Blackie: The Egg Thief (A Little Book for Little Readers) by Douglas Quinn

REEL STUFF: A LESSOR AND MOORE
MYSTERY by Don Bruns

Charles and Hero: Isle of Mists by Douglas Quinn

The
Last Refuge
by Chris Knopf (FFB Review)

Baby Shark’s Grass Widow Legacy by Robert Fate

Thuglit: Issue Nine Edited by Todd Robinson

The Tattoo Murder Case byAkimitsu
Takagi (FFB Review by Patrick Ohl)

Nightzone: The Posadas County
Mysteries
by Steven F. Havill

The
Corpse In The Car by John Rhode (FFB Review by Patrick
Ohl)

KIRINYAGA: A FABLE OF UTOPIA by Mike Resnick (FFB Review by Barry Ergang)

This week, giving away mysteries set in England, Deborah Crombie's The
Sound of Broken Glass and Sam Thomas' The Harlot's Tale. Details on my
blog, http://www.lesasbookcritiques.blogspot.com. Entries from the U.S.
only, please.

Back before he
started contributing reviews for Friday’s Forgetten Books, Barry did a number
of reviews for this blog. His review of KIRINYAGA: A FABLE OF UTOPIA by Mike
Resnick was one of those reviews. It runs again today as part of FFB. Make sure
you check out the list here of other great reads when it comes out later today.

KIRINYAGA: A FABLE OF UTOPIA by Mike Resnick

reviewed by Barry Ergang

Among all of the
highly readable, intelligent and well-crafted novels Mike Resnick has written,
I have three favorites: Walpurgis III, The Dark Lady, and the book under
consideration here: Kirinyaga: A Fable ofUtopia (Del
Rey/Ballantine, 1998).

Although Resnick
considers it a novel, it developed from a short story he was asked to write by
Orson Scott Card for an anthology about future Utopian societies. “Because of
my love for Africa,” Resnick explains in an afterword, “and my knowledge of
East Africa in particular, I chose to write about a Kikuyu Utopia. The story
was ‘Kirinyaga,’ and I handed it to Scott at the 1987 World Science Fiction
Convention in Brighton, England, where I stopped for a few days on my way down
to Kenya for another safari....

“...Even before
Scott let me know he was buying it, I took my Kenya safari--and a strange thing
happened. Maybe it was because I had just written ‘Kirinyaga’ a couple of weeks
earlier and it was still fresh in my mind, maybe it was because my subconscious
is a lot smarter than my conscious mind, but whatever the reason, I realized
that ‘Kirinyaga’ was not a stand-alone story, but rather the first chapter in a
book....

“I decided to write
the book a chapter at a time, and to sell each chapter as a short story...but
never to lose sight of the fact that these stories were really chapters in a
novel, which, when completed, would build to a climax as a novel does, and have
a coda after the climax, as so many of my own novels do.”

Spanning the period
from 2123 to 2137, Kirinyaga is narrated by Koriba, a man of Kikuyu
descent who was educated at Cambridge and Yale, who reveres what Kenya and his
culture was and has come to reject what it has become:

“In the beginning,
Ngai lived alone atop the mountain called Kirinyaga. In the fullness of time He
created three sons, who became the fathers of the Maasai, the Kamba, and the
Kikuyu races, and to each son He offered a spear, a bow, and a digging stick.
The Maasai chose the spear, and was told to tend herds on the vast savannah.
The Kamba chose the bow, and was sent to the dense forests to hunt for game.
But Gikuyu, the first Kikuyu, knew that Ngai loved the earth and the seasons,
and chose the digging stick. To reward him for this Ngai not only taught him
the secrets of the seed and the harvest, but gave him Kirinyaga, with its holy
fig tree and rich lands.

“The sons and
daughters of Gikuyu remained on Kirinyaga until the white man came and took
their lands away, and even when the white man had been banished they did not
return, but chose to remain in the cities, wearing Western clothes and using
Western machines and living Western lives. Even I, who am a mundumugu--a
witch doctor--was born in the city. I have never seen the lion or the elephant
or the rhinoceros, for all of them were extinct before my birth; nor have I
seen Kirinyaga as Ngai meant it to be seen, for a bustling, overcrowded city of
three million inhabitants covers its slopes, every year approaching closer and
closer to Ngai’s throne at the summit. Even the Kikuyu have forgotten its true
name, and now know it only as Mount Kenya.”

Along with a group
of like-minded people, Koriba leaves Earth to live on a chartered, terraformed
planetoid called Kirinyaga, where he reverts to the old ways of the Kikuyu. As
their mundumugu, he’s the repository of the collected wisdom and customs
of the tribe, living alone and apart from the rest but participating daily in
their lives, the most feared and venerated among them--feared even by Koinnage,
the paramount chief. Only Koriba possesses the computer that allows him to
communicate with Maintenance, which can change the orbit of Kirinyaga to
maintain or alter climatic conditions. Koriba uses this facility, unknown to
his people, to his own advantage, bringing rain or drought as he sees fit,
often to fulfill his own prophecies and prayers to Ngai.

Each chapter
presents Koriba with a new problem that threatens the Utopia he and the others
have created. Invoking tribal laws with a fanatical stringency, he tries to
find solutions. Not all of the solutions are happy ones, but Koriba is
determined to prevent any change that will corrupt tradition, even if it means
bettering his people’s lot--by what he sees as European standards. Ultimately
he is forced to realize that change in a society is inevitable, that inherent
in the concept of Utopia is stasis and stagnation, and that one man’s idea of
perfection can be another’s agony. Resnick’s artistry lies in portraying
Koriba’s fanaticism so that the reader is simultaneously repelled by and
sympathetic to it. He and the other characters, and the problems that befall
them because of the society they’ve created, will resonate in the reader’s mind
long after the book has been put down.

Easily Mike
Resnick’s finest work, Kirinyaga is, to date, the most honored book in
the history of science fiction. Read it, and you’ll understand why.

Tuesday, February 25, 2014

Back in July 2002 I started writing reviews on Epinions. In fact, I started posting reviews there before I started this blog. Over the years, I slowly built a following while making a lot of social connections. Over many months I started making a few dollars here and there as the site went through some ups and downs.

Over the years I was told by publishers, authors, agents, and others in the industry not to waste my time putting my reviews of works they were involved with up on Epinions because the site was so difficult to search. Books were the forgotten bastard child of the site and it showed. When Google changed their systems to lower the ratings of content mills, such as Associated Content (now Yahoo Voices) and Demand Studios, among others, Epinions took a real hit though it was not a content mill. It was collateral damage.

Awhile back Epinions was bought by eBay and things began to change. Just last fall before the holiday season they disabled the functionality needed for me to request to add books that were not already in their system. I always had to request titles be added over the years, but it got way worse last year. About 90 percent of the books I reviewed, whether they were self published or New York Times bestsellers, were not in the system and had to be added for me to be able to write about them there.

One never has that issue at Amazon.

Not only did they remove that functionality, they also changed things so that no one could add content if it was not tied into the eBay catalog. If the eBay catalog did not list the item it could be be added by any one for any reason. Millions of additional products that were promised for those of us still hanging in at the site to write on never materialized. Because of the actions by management the critical holiday season was totally missed. Instead of fixing glaringly obvious problems there seemed to be a management down attitude of blaming the membership--especially those of us who had been around a very long time and had standards in terms of review quality and expectations regarding site issues.

As the new year dawned they made additional changes which diminished the quality of the reviews. Despite repeated promises by those in charge to fix the search capability for the site, they did absolutely nothing. The result was a steadily worsening problem as so much new and old did not exist in the database. While I could have written on about ant toothpaste, I could not write on Thuglit: Issue Nine, Baby Sharks Grass Widow Legacy, Archie Solves The Case and many, many other books.

Reviewing books is what I do. I don't review baking mix, toothpaste, deodorant, or shampoo.

Management has finally made their gross incompetence publicly and without question known tonight as they have officially killed the site. I received the below in my e-mail a little while ago and it is also now posted on the site. Epinions is dead and as often the case its demise was solely caused by ongoing managerial stupidity.

Dear Epinions Member,

After a challenging 2013, Epinions will no longer maintain community
related operations of its website. We are proud that we were able to
serve as a facilitator of shared experiences and thoughtful dialogue
over the past 15 years. However, several obstacles, such as declining
participation, have deeply affected our business and forced us to make
this difficult decision.

We would like to thank each of you for your time and dedication. You
have supported us through the good times and the bad. Our community's
passion and uniqueness has made our website truly special.

As of February 25, 2014, we will begin to disable the Epinions community features.

Here's what it means for the Epinions community:

• No new content will be added to the Epinions website as of February 25, 2014.

• The ability to write a review, comment, and rate will be disabled on February 25, 2014.

• The last Income Share payment will be issued on March 6, 2014 via PayPal.

• The option to export all of your Epinions reviews will be made available to you.

• You will still be able to login to your Epinions account to check
your balance and use the Epinions message boards until March 25, 2014.

After March 25, 2014, all Epinions community features will be removed and/or disabled from the Epinions website.

This was not an easy decision to make and we thank you all for your
contributions to Epinions. While we must change, we truly hope your
desire to connect, write reviews and share experiences with one another
stays alive and well.

If you have additional questions, please feel free to reference our FAQ or contact us.

Sincerely,

The Epinions Team

Important Dates:
• March 6, 2014 - February Income Share Payout, Sweepstakes Payouts, and an additional Bonus Payout.
• March 25, 2014 - All Epinions community features removed and login to Epinions site disabled.

Monday, February 24, 2014

So far so good as there seems to have been no allergic reaction to the IVIG that she got last Friday. It took until Sunday afternoon before the other drugs they gave her before the deal seemed to clear her system. Up to that point she had been very sleepy and rather out of it. By late Sunday afternoon she suddenly seemed better and more like her normal self.

Or, what is normal these days. Far cry from the old normal, but we take what we can get now as long as we can.

In our new edition of Crime Review (*www.crimereview.co.uk
*) this week we have sixteen new
reviews (*http://crimereview.co.uk/latest_reviews.php*), together with Gunnar
Staalesen in the Countdown interview hot seat:
(*http://crimereview.co.uk/page.php/interview/705*)
Reviews this week are:
ALL I DID WAS SHOOT MY MAN by Walter Mosley reviewed by John Cleal
Private investigator Leonid McGill helped frame an innocent woman for a
huge robbery at an insurance company. When he regrets his actions and
decides to free her from prison, he sets in motion events which threaten
her, himself and his family.
THE SECRETS OF LIFE AND DEATH by Rebecca Alexander reviewed by Laura Parkin
1585 - Dr John Dee and his assistant Edward Kelley attempt to find a cure
for the Countess Bathory's terrible illness...only to discover a dark
secret. 2013 - Jackdaw Hammond is forced to reveal who she really is to
police consultant Felix Guichard after several girls' bodies are found
covered in occult symbols, and she was the last person to see them alive.
A DEATH IN VALENCIA by Jason Webster reviewed by Chris Roberts
Chief Inspector Max Camera is pulled from the murder of a local
restaurateur when the owner of an abortion clinic is kidnapped.
DARK DAWN by Matt McGuire reviewed by John Cleal
A teenager is found kneecapped and killed in a luxury development on
Belfast's River Lagan. Acting DS John O'Neill faces a wall of silence,
indifference and a hostile senior officer as he enters the world of
violence, drug dealing and corruption that is post-Troubles Belfast.
THE CASE OF THE LOVE COMMANDOS by Tarquin Hall reviewed by Sylvia Wilson
Vish Puri helps the Love Commandos to find a missing untouchable boy who is
in love with a high caste girl. In the process, he investigates the murder
of the boy's mother and uncovers the exploitation of illiterate villagers
by an international DNA company and a tale of political corruption at the
highest level.
STAY ALIVE by Simon Kernick reviewed by Linda Wilson
A family canoeing trip leads to terror for teenager Jess Grainger when she
ends up helping a mysterious woman escape from the men with guns who are
clearly trying to kill her. Jess soon discovers that they'll kill anyone
who gets in their way.
BLACK FRIDAYS by Michael Sears reviewed by Arnold Taylor
Jason Stafford, an outstanding Wall Street trader, has just been released
from prison, having been found guilty of fixing the books. He is
unemployable in his former capacity and is grateful when the head of an
investment firm asks him to look into problems caused by a trader who has
recently died.
JUST ONE EVIL ACT by Elizabeth George reviewed by Sylvia Maughan
One of DS Barbara Haver's neighbours, a child, is abducted and her mother
is also missing. The child's father takes extreme measures to try to
retrieve her while Barbara lets her emotions control her actions.
SOMEONE ELSE'S SKIN by Sarah Hilary reviewed by Sharon Wheeler
DI Marnie Rome and DS Noah Jake are called to a women's refuge where a man
has been stabbed. What they find turns all their expectations upside down
as the violence escalates.
THE DEAD by Howard Lynsky reviewed by John Cleal
Gang boss David Blake is back on top until the arrest of his accountant for
child murder sparks a chain of events which put Blake's empire - and life -
at risk.
HIGH ROLLERS by Jack Bowman reviewed by Linda Wilson
National Transportation Safety Board investigator Tom Patrick is first on
the scene when the engine of an aircraft on the ground at Los Angeles
airport tears itself apart killing three men and injuring six more. And
it's not the only 737 that has problems as the death toll starts to rise.
BARCELONA SHADOWS by Marc Pastor reviewed by Chris Roberts
In early 20th century Barcelona, Inspectors Corvo and Malsano seek the
monster abducting children for the most grisly of purposes.
THE TOY TAKER by Luke Delaney reviewed by Linda Wilson
Someone is taking children from the safety of their houses in the middle of
the night, getting in through locked doors while their parents are
sleeping. It's DI Sean Corrigan's job to find them.
SACRIFICE by Will Jordan reviewed by Linda Wilson
Ryan Drake and his Shepherd team specialize in finding people and bringing
them back. This time they're off to Afghanistan to bring back a senior CIA
operative held by insurgents.
PENANCE by Dan O'Shea reviewed by John Cleal
When an elderly woman is shot dead by a sniper after leaving the
confessional, Chicago detective John Lynch is assigned to investigate and
enters a murky world of political ambition and double cross.
BAGDAD CENTRAL by Elliott Colla reviewed by Chris Roberts
In post-invasion Baghdad, former police inspector Khafaji is seized by the
Americans and pressed into unwilling service.
Best wishes
Sharon

THE HEADMASTER’S WIFE Thomas Christopher Greene Sharon Mensing
This is the story of how it happens that the headmaster of a prestigious
boarding school is found wandering naked through Central Park and what
actually happened to his wife.

THE FIRE DANCE Helene Tursten Barbara Fister
When a dancer is found dead in a burned building, Inspector Irene Huss
wonders if the death may be linked to a fire that killed the woman's
stepfather years earlier

A KILLING OF ANGELS Kate Rhodes P D Crumbaker
London psychologist Alice Quentin teams up with detective Don Burns once
more as they race to stop a serial killer at work in London’s financial
district

RUNNER Patrick Lee Anne Corey
Sam Dryden, ex-special forces, is on the run--he has become the target
of a far-reaching government conspiracy as he tries to save a young girl
with special powers.

WORTHY BROWN'S DAUGHTER Phillip Margolin Yvonne Klein
Matthew Penny, a young lawyer newly arrived in Portland, Oregon in 1860,
defends an ex-slave accused of killing his former owner in a trial held
in an atmosphere of racial prejudice and corruption.

MURDER IN THE AFTERNOON Frances Brody Meredith Frazier
Kate Shackleton, Jim Sykes, and Marcus Charles are called in to
investigate a missing - possibly murdered - man and find that the
mystery is closely tied to Kate herself.

LIFE AFTER LIFE (Audio) Kate Atkinson Lourdes Venard
Ursula Todd, born in 1910, lives her life many times over, each time a
bit differently

A KILLING IN THE HILLS (audio) Julia Keller Karla Jay
Acker's Gap, WV, prosecuting attorney Bell Elkins has her hands full
finding the murderer of three men in the local diner while she tries to
hold back drug traffic.

ALMOST CRIMINAL E. R. Brown Jim Napier
A seventeen-year-old boy is drawn into the world of illicit drugs to
support his family, and before long he must find a way to protect
himself and his family from conflicts he only dimly understands

THE AMAZING HARVEY Don Passman Deb Shoss
Title character Harvey Kendall needs all his professional magician's
skills to solve a murder when all the evidence points to him.

THE RAVEN'S EYE Barry Maitland Ben Neal
Brock & Kolla battle bureaucratic resistance when investigating the
death of a young woman who was living under an assumed identity.

DEEP WINTER Samuel W. Gailey Sharon Mensing
A mentally challenged man is framed for a murder, and many more deaths
occur before things get sorted out.

NIGHT TERRORS Dennis Palumbo Anne Corey
Dan Rinaldi, a psychotherapist who consults on criminal investigations,
is drawn into finding the perpetrator of a series of related murders as
well as preventing further killings, risking his own life while doing so .

WHERE MONSTERS DWELL Jørgen Brekke Barbara Fister
When a woman is gruesomely murdered in a university library in
Trondheim, Norway and a rare book is stolen, it echoes a crime in the US.

THE EXECUTION Dick Wolf Christine Zibas
The second in the series finds Jeremy Fisk having to join forces with
Mexican police as a Mexican drug cartel threatens to bring the drug war
to New York City and the UN.

We post more than 900 new reviews a year -- all of them are archived on
the site -- as well as a new interview with a top author every issue.

Another Sunday and another author whom I am honored to know and be a part of things here. Author of Rogue Island (reviewed here) and Cliff Walk (reviewed here)I was amazed and absolutely thrilled when he wanted to contribute something in advance of his new novel Providence Rag currently scheduled for release on March 11. Instead of the normal sample from a book, author Bruce DeSilva wanted to do something a little different. I was not about to say no.

Like most newspaper professionals these days, Liam
Mulligan, a fictional investigative reporter at The Providence Dispatch, fears the future.

The paper’s longtime-owners, a group of wealthy Rhode
Island families who have controlled the Dispatch
since the Civil War, always ran the place as a public service. For decades,
they held out against the nationwide trend of local owners selling out to
chains, and Mulligan has been grateful for that. But now, after too many years
of declining circulation and advertising, the owners have reluctantly put the
paper on the market. And the only suitor is a bottom-feeding media conglomerate
that cares about nothing but the bottom line.

Mulligan is a wisecracking tough guy. Not much
phases him. But he shudders when he thinks about what’s coming. For him,
investigative reporting has always been a calling—like the priesthood but
without the sex. But he’s in his forties now, and he knows his days as a
newspaperman are numbered. He doubts he could ever be any good at anything
else.

For where he sits, other metropolitan newspapers
aren’t much of an option. Nearly all of them, hemorrhaging readers and revenue,
have become mere shells of the vital institutions they once were. And few of
them are hiring. They are laying people off.

Television news and online news websites don’t look
like much of an option either. Network television news departments, never all
that great to begin with, have shriveled into irrelevance. Twenty-four-hour
cable news channels spew endless loops of trivial celebrity gossip, provide
soap boxes for blowhards, and poison the public discourse with partisan
distortions and misinformation. And the handful of internet news websites
striving to be more than propaganda organs for the left and right lack the
revenue streams required to cover the news with breadth and depth.

Mulligan, the protagonist of my Edgar Award-winning
series of hardboiled crime novels, sees nothing on the horizon to replace
newspapers as honest brokers of information. He’s appalled at how much damage
their demise is doing to the American democracy.

If I were younger, I’d be in the same fix Mulligan
is in. In recent years, I grew weary of being part of a rear-guard action and
dispirited over the inevitability of the journalism’s decline. But I fought the
good fight. The last major project I oversaw as a senior Associated Press
editor, an investigative series about the exploitation of child gold miners in
Africa, was a finalist for the Pulitzer Prize. But five years ago, when the AP
offered an early retirement package—part of its own retrenchment in the face of
economic pressures—I decided it was time for a second act.

I’m a full-time novelist now, and the third novel in
my Mulligan crime series, Providence Rag,
will be published in hardcover and e-book editions on March 11.The book has already received starred reviews
in Publishers Weekly and Booklist.

In each Mulligan novel, my protagonist shows his
grit by investigating crime and corruption in the state of his birth. In Rogue Island, he investigates an arson
spree that is destroying the working class Providence, R.I., neighborhood where
he was raised. In Cliff Walk, he
investigates political corruption that has allowed the state’s rampant sex
trade to thrive. And in Providence Rag,
he and the entire state struggle with the ethical dilemma of what to do about a
psychopath who is being held in prison on phony charges because he is too
dangerous to be set loose.

I want my novels to be enjoyed as suspenseful entertainment—but
they are also about something more. It is my hope that as readers follow the
skill and dedication with which Mulligan pursues the truth under increasingly
difficult circumstances, they will gain a greater appreciation for what all of
us are losing as newspapers fade into history.

Bruce
DeSilva grew up in a tiny Massachusetts mill town where the mill closed when he
was ten. He had an austere childhood bereft of iPods, X-Boxes, and all the
other cool stuff that hadn’t been invented yet. I this parochial little town,
metaphors and alliteration were also in short supply. Nevertheless, his crime
fiction has won the Edgar and Macavity Awards; has been listed as a finalist
for the Shamus, Anthony, and Barry Awards; and has been published in ten
foreign languages. His short stories have appeared in Akashic Press's
award-winning noir anthologies. He has reviewed books for The New York Times
Sunday Book Review and Publishers Weekly, and his reviews for The Associated
Press have appeared in hundreds of other publications. Previously, he was a
journalist for forty years, most recently as writing coach world-wide for AP,
editing stories that won nearly every major journalism prize including the
Pulitzer. He and his wife, the poet Patricia Smith, live in New Jersey with two
enormous dogs named Brady and Rondo.

Up this morning in Kings River Life Magazine reviews &
giveaways of another fun group of Penguin mystery authors-"A Fatal Slip":
A Sweet Nothing’s Lingerie Mystery by Meg London "A Tale of Two Biddies":
A League of Literary Ladies Mystery by Kylie Logan, "A Tough Nut to Kill":
A Nut House Mystery by Elizabeth Lee, "Beewitched": A Queen Bee
Mystery by Hannah Reed, and "Poison at the PTA"
by Laura Alden
http://kingsriverlife.com/02/22/more-february-penguin-mystery-fun/

Just completed a cozy mystery giveaway, and this week I'm giving away two
mysteries that are grittier, D.E. Johnson's Detroit Shuffle and Rick
Gavin's Nowhere Nice. Details on my blog at
http://www.lesasbookcritiques.blogspot.com. Entries from the U.S. only,
please.

Friday, February 21, 2014

Minutes ago we arrived back home and Sandi is already back to sleep as today has not been an easy one. After blood work this morning, they gave her the first dose of IVIG. This is supposed to stabilize her immune system and will be given monthly until the summer. At that point, a session will be skipped and her numbers checked. She tolerated the infusion fairly well and those in charge seemed happy about that.

What was not good news was the fact that her kidney function seems to have taken another major nose dive along with a troubling trend with her protein levels. Both are dropping and that does not help with her worsening swelling in her feet and lower legs. Water and protein shakes are advised for now though if this does not get better more tests will have to be planned to check various major organs.

One hopes that does not become necessary. In the meantime, we are to watch for any sort of allergic reason or anything out of the ordinary.

Friday means Friday’s Forgotten Books
with Patti Abbott hosted here later today. Patrick Ohl is back and his obsession
with the Golden Age continues….

Lady Misterton was a general pain in the
derrière to everyone she came into
contact with. But on this occasion, she really crossed the limit. While driving
through Windsor Great Park, she commanded her chauffeur, William Fitchley, to
pull over. She had forgotten her handbag back at her residence, Clandown
Towers. However, she orders the chauffeur to walk the three-and-a-half miles back to fetch the bag. Fitchley
walks off obediently as Lady Misterton sat down and began to knit, while a
portable wireless radio played Saint-Saens’ Danse
Macabre. When Fitchley arrived at Clandown Towers, he found out that Lady
Misterton had taken her bag with her after all…

Furious, Fitchley decides to dally on
the way back and stops at a pub for a “quick one”. Unfortunately, when he
exits, he fails to notice an oncoming vehicle. He is hit and hospitalized… But
what about Lady Misterton?

Unfortunately, the old broa—er, lady, failed to recognize the signs that
she was trapped in a mystery. She was, perhaps, at a slight disadvantage, since
Jonathan Creek was not around yet to
use Danse Macabre as its theme song.
However, that doesn’t change the fact that a few hours later, Lady Misterton
was found dead in her car, and the cause of death cannot be determined. This
forms the plot of John Rhode’s The Corpse
in the Car…

Why yes, the book is an impossible crime
of sorts, as Dr. Lancelot Priestley is called in to determine how an assassin
can strike someone down at will without leaving any traces behind. And what a
job Priestley does! The method employed has a diabolical ingenuity underlying
it, and the doctor does a bang-up job deducing whodunit, how, and constructing
a solid case for the prosecution. Unfortunately, as is often the case with John
Rhode, the murderer’s identity is extremely easy to spot. However, that doesn’t
change the cleverness demonstrated by the rest of the plot, which had me
completely fooled. It also doesn’t hurt that I really like tricks in this
general vein.

However, this book contains more than a
good plot. I venture to say that it is invaluable
for exposing the lie inherent in the idea that Golden Age authors were always
romanticizing the upper class. John Rhode is absolutely relentless towards Lady Misterton. She is a genuinely disturbing
person at times— she professes herself to be a lover of cats. There’s no harm
in that, right? Well… this adoration goes to such lengths that whenever one of
her cats dies, she has it stuffed and added to a macabre collection of stuffed
cats, of which there are 42 (!!!). While alive, she did her best to distance
herself from fellow human beings as much as possible, showing an incredible
snobbery that Rhode certainly does not approve of!

Other upper class characters are
similarly skewered, particularly Lady Misterton’s brother, Mr. Ormskirk. Nastiness
seems to run in the family, as he is only concerned with how he can profit by
his sister’s death… now that she’s dead, that is. While she was alive, he was
only concerned with what a fool she was being, paying attention to a charming
young fellow who professed himself to be a fellow lover of cats. Lady
Misterton’s niece, Emily Higson, is portrayed with sympathy— she married a
clerk in a legal office who isn’t particularly rich, but they have a decent
life together. But Lady Misterton couldn’t stand
him, for the simple reason that he didn’t have money. Lady Misterton was able
to marry into money, why couldn’t her niece do the same thing?

Then there’s the chauffeur Fitchley, who
was hired specifically because his father was a taxidermist and thus, Lady
Misterton could continue having her cats stuffed for a meagre 30 shillings a
week. Fitchley is ruthlessly exploited by Lady Misterton and he is far more
sympathetic— he’s a clever, resourceful fellow who knows how to use his brains.
The only reason he’s stuck in her service is because he was desperate for money
and there isn’t much of a market for taxidermy any more. The character reminds
me of a clever child in Rhode’s Death on Sunday, who is ignored by
his mother and disliked by fellow guests at a residential hotel…. But Rhode’s
sympathies seem to lie with the child, who is the only person there doing
anything really worthwhile!

Overall, John Rhode’s The Corpse in the Car is an excellent
book that showcases Rhode’s storytelling talents very well. The plot moves
along very rapidly and has several intriguing threads chasing each other,
involving the theft of one of the stuffed cats and a potential will that may or
may not be missing (assuming it exists). It’s finely-crafted and shows Dr.
Priestley at his scientific best, not letting a single anomaly get by him
without an explanation. If you’ve never read John Rhode and want a good place
to start, this is it.

Patrick
Ohl is a 20-year old Canadian crime fiction aficionado who enjoys hobbies such
as taxidermy and runs a dilapidated motel in the middle of nowhere alongside
his crazed mother. He enjoys relaxing in his subterranean evil lair while
watching his favourite hockey team, the Toronto Maple Leafs, and will
occasionally make chicken chow mein to die for. His life is accompanied by a
soundtrack composed by John Williams, and James Earl Jones provides occasional
voice-overs.

You can't go wrong picking up a book written by Bill Crider. This is what I said about MURDER MOST FOWL back in 2008....

Progress has come to Blackstone County, Texas. Hack got his computer at the jail. The computer is nice and all that and though he feelsvindicated he isn't satisfied. They need televisions in the jail. And he wants cameras for the patrol cars. Considering how many times Sheriff Rhodes has had a physical alteration next to his county car, camerasmight be a good thing.

What isn't a good thing in the minds of many is that Wal-Mart has set up right outside Clearview. As has happened across the country in numerous small towns, the arrival of thebig chain has destroyed the small downtown area of Clearview. A once thriving downtown is now vacant and virtually empty of any pedestrian traffic. The arrival of the store has caused the closing of most of theMom and Pop stores as well as driving off some of the smaller chains.Elijah "Lige" Ward used to have a hardware store. These days he chains himself to the front doors of Wal-Mart in protest demanding the store to close.

Of course, Sheriff Rhodes has to go out and deal with that situation. Emus have also come to the county and as a result there are now thefts of Emus instead of cattle. While cattle rustling can be racked and dealt with, Emu theft is a bit trickier. The old standby, chickens, is still around and still being raised to fight by some on the county. You know with all this going on, there will be another murder and Rhodes will soon be working the case, chasing suspects, and dealing with a host of other issues in the county.

At least it is early June and election season is far off. He's going to lose a few votes by finding out all the dirt on his neighbors. Sheriff Dan Rhodes wouldn't have it any other way. Well, he would like not to get in some many brawls with suspects and he probably would like to be home for dinner on a more regular basis.

Released in 1994, this novel takes readers back to Blackstone County for another adventure in an idyllic setting.The recurring characters, except his daughter, Susan return. Ivy makes a couple of appearances to bounce ideas of as well as to provide dietary comedic life. Marrying Ivy has changed the sheriff in many ways, including his pantry. It also seems to have regulated her to a role less on stage which is too bad because she is interesting and a character worth having around.

Another solidly good outing that keeps the series going and provides an interesting case for the good sheriff. Cozies don't get much better then this and it is a good one.

Have some fun. Read my interview with Tall Chambers. He's a Jason Bourne who knows exactly who he is, he's less super but more human than Jack Reacher, he's a Clint Eastwood for the 21st Century.
http://earlwstaggs.wordpress.com
Earl Staggs

This is probably a good time to mention this ....if you would like a walking advertisement for your product and are willing to send me a t-shirt or polo style shirt that is 5X with your ad I will wear it. The shirt ad has to be clean so no naked ladies, obscene gestures, etc. Said shirt would be worn in public to the grocery store, public library, and various doctor and treatment centers as well as wherever else I have to go in and around Plano, Texas.

This week I am
truly honored to have a Sample Sunday piece from Texas author and legend Bill
Crider. While primarily known for his Sheriff Dan Rhodes series, Bill does a
lot of different things under the writing big top. The excerpt below comes from
his humorous young adult novel The Girl
Who Wanted to be Sherlock Holmeswhich
is also a suitable read for us adults.

Amazon Synopsis:
“Shirley Holmes believes she's a descendant of another Holmes. Sherlock. You
say he's a fictional character? Don't try to tell that to Shirley. When there's
a murder at her high school, Shirley's determined to find the killer, along
with Ralph, her willing "Watson." THE GIRL WHO WANTED TO BE SHERLOCK HOLMES is fast and fun for all
ages.”

Before I tell you about finding the
dead man, I have to tell you about a girl I know.

Her name's Shirley Holmes, and her
name is very important to her.That's
because about a hundred years ago, more or less, there was a famous detective
named Sherlock Holmes.

Shirley Holmes.Sherlock Holmes.

You see the connection?Neither do I, since as I tried to explain to
Shirley, Sherlock Holmes is a fictional character, not a real person.

"He's just a person in
stories," is the way I put it."He's not real."

"And just how do you know that,
Ralph-o?" she asked, looking down at me.She's about the same height I am, which is five-seven, but somehow she
seems taller.I don't know how she does
it.

And that's just one of the annoying
things about her. Another one is that she never fails to call me The Ralphster,
or Ralph-o, or Ralphola, or The Ralphmeister.It’s not very dignified if you ask me.

Of course Ralph's my name; I can't
deny that, as much as I wish that I could.If I'd had any say-so in it, I'd have been called Clint, or maybe
Thorne, like a guy on the soap opera that my father watches every day.Maybe you've seen it.The Bold and the Beautiful.But of course I didn't have any say-so, and I
got named Ralph.It could be worse, I
guess.I could have been named
Fauntleroy, maybe, or Alphonse.

I can see that I've drifted off the
point here, which is something that I'm prone to do, according to Ms. Turkel,
my English teacher.She's always writing
crabby little notes in red ink in the margin of my papers, saying things like
"This is really very interesting, Ralph, but what does it have to do with
your thesis?"

She calls me Ralph, naturally.All the teachers do.The name's right there on my Permanent
Record, so what can I do about it?

But I was telling you about
Shirley.She has red hair and green eyes
and freckles, and the truth is I like the way she looks a whole lot, but I'd
never come out and tell her that.We're
both juniors at Harry Whittington High School, and we take a lot of the same
classes.

We've
known each other a long time, ever since second grade, but I've only noticed
how nice she looks in the last year or so.I never paid much attention to things like that about girls very much
before, but I've started noticing it pretty often since about the ninth
grade.It has a lot to do with hormones,
according to Mr. Wilder.He teaches
biology, so he knows what he's talking about.

Known for his legendary
insomnia it would surprise no one to learn that retired Posadas County sheriff
William K. Gastner is out and about somewhere in the county in the long hours
of the night. This February night at one in the morning finds him on a rim rock
of Cat Mesa wrapped up in a blanket looking at the stars and thinking about
Bennett's Trail and his recent discovery of a Colt single action revolver
lodged in a nearby crevice. Along with the possible history of a legendary
weapon, also on his mind is the upcoming concert by one of the children of UndersheriffEstelle Reyes Guzman and the fact that his small
adobe home is going to serve as the host for the traveling faculty and stage
crew in just a few days.

His thoughts are interrupted
by two flashes of light far to the south more than at least 20 miles away. Over
the next few minutes, Gastner sees what appears to be the start of a prairie wildfire
as well as a pair of headlights going north on County Road 14. Whomever is on
that stretch of gravel road seems to be fleeing where the building prairie wildfire
started. Bill Gastner calls it in and then, like the police officer he was and
to a certain extent still is, is drawn to where the action is as things rapidly
escalate. Before long, Gastner is being second guessed by those who should know
better, is a target of a psycho, and a wealthy rancher wants him for a job.
Everybody wants a piece of him while all Gastner wants to do is stay out of it
and listen to the music.

Steven F. Havill's latest in
the series now branded as The Posadas County Mysteries is
another good one. Gastner takes primary stage, as he used to when this series
first started with Heartshot,and reminds loyal readers just how
good he can be. Much like Sheriff Dan Rhodes as envisioned by Bill Crider or
Sheriff Walt Longmire by Craig Johnson, Bill Gastner is an old friend and very
much welcome companion.

Nightzone: The Posadas County
Mysteries reflects an author at the top of his game in a story that is
full throttle from start to finish. Featuring a number of characters long
familiar to series readers, the tale is of family just as much as crime. As
always, the author's love for the New Mexico landscape depicted in the
fictional Posadas County is clear and detailed in yet another simply great
read.

Material courtesy of the
good folks of the Haggard Branch of the Plano Texas Public Library System.

EDITORIAL NOTE: Barry Ergang is reading the first book, Heartshot, and alerted me to the fact that it is William C. Gastner in that book as opposed to the William K. Gastner here. A quick check on Amazon of both books verified the middle name discrepancy. I am not changing it here as I can only go by what the author wrote. No matter the middle name, these are great books and I strongly recommend this series.

Friday, February 14, 2014

Back home and Sandi's kidney function has vastly improved which is a huge relief. Other blood work looked okay. Plan is for blood work next Friday with a doctor visit as well as the six hour plus IVIG infusion to hopefully stabalize her immune system.

Friday means Friday’s Forgotten Books
with Patti Abbott. The list will be here
later today. In the meantime, please welcome back Patrick Ohl…

There is a legend about three powerful
sorcerers who once lived in the Nagano prefecture. They were known as
Tsunedahime, Jiraiya, and Orochimaru, and have been the subjects of numerous
legends, plays … and tattoos. Akimitsu Takagi’s The Tattoo Murder Case involves the story of three such tattoos.

Mysteries in Japan have evolved in a
completely different direction than those in the Anglo-Saxon world, at least
from what I can gather. I don’t know Japanese, nor am I too familiar with the
culture, but the translations we get into English only seem to confirm the
idea. It seems that in Japan, the “game” is still highly respected—you give the
readers all the clues and you tell a story instead of wallowing in angst and
self-pity. In other words, a Japanese detective novel is about a mystery, and not about telling readers
how awful society is, vaguely disguising the lecture as a mystery by throwing
in a corpse or two and some violence.

So as you can probably tell, I eagerly
looked forward to revisiting the Japanese detective story, finally settling on The Tattoo Murder Case. This particular
book was originally published in 1948, and was published in English by Soho
Press. And much to my delight, I discovered that it involved a locked-room
mystery!

In itself, that posed a difficulty,
because Japanese-style homes do not lend themselves very well to the
locked-room mystery. Takagi finds a way around this, however, and an
explanation is given in full. The situation is an intriguing one: a woman,
beautifully tattooed, is found in her locked bathroom, murdered. More
specifically, her head and limbs are found, because some maniac has carted off
the tattooed torso for himself!!!

And thus the plot is set into motion.
Steeped in the world of that Japanese art tattoo, The Tattoo Murder Case is a fascinating read. You really get a lot
of information on post-WWII Japan, with American GI’s roaming the streets,
side-by-side with Japanese citizens who are still getting used to the Emperor’s
announcement that he is not, after all, a God. Tattoos are still technically
illegal, and the police might choose any time to crack down on them, so a sense
of shadiness is embedded right into the plot. When the author talks about these
tattoos and the appreciation societies and the mad collectors who literally
will decorate their homes with tattooed human skins… the book is at its most
fascinating.

There’s also a lot of neat touches of
social commentary, all done quite subtly. I’m sort of surprised you could get
away with publishing this kind of stuff in 1948… although then again, this was Japan and there was a fifty-year
delay in getting it published in the States. Some of this material is rather
sickening in fact, such as one point in the story in which several prostitutes
are questioned, and one of them is a mere fourteen years old. Then there’s the
nearly-sexual fetish one character has for tattoos… And the most disturbingly
beautiful art collection I’ve ever read about!

Unfortunately, the plot doesn’t quite
live up to its promise. The situation is intriguing and there are several moments
with seemingly-supernatural touches. All of this is excellent build-up to a
rather anticlimactic finish. Most of the plot’s secrets become fairly obvious
by the end, with only one or two surprises left. One of these surprises is how
the locked-room trick was worked… but to be honest, I’ve never been a fan of
such tricks. All the variations work on the same principle. With merely a few
memorably ingenious exceptions, they all seem to boil down to one major
mish-mash of a category of locked-room solutions. It’s very underwhelming to
say the least. Instead of a gasp of astonishment—“How could I have been so
silly as to not see it?”my reactions was more of an: “Oh, so it was
just this type of solution all over again…”

There’s one other major problem with the
book, and that is the translation. It’s not
a bad translation, let me clear that up, and I’m not blaming anyone here, least
of all translator Deborah Boehm. In fact I’d love to see more of this sort of
stuff translated. However, there is a
lot of explanatory material in
the book. Some of it makes sense, but much of it seems out of place—something
any Japanese reader at the time would not have needed to be told. That
information seems like it was added to help explain things to the Western
reader, but to be honest, they tend to interrupt narrative flow. That’s why I
prefer the footnote approach personally.

Still, The Tattoo Murder Case is an interesting book overall. It reads
like a Japanese S. S. Van Dine without Philo Vance. It’s just as tricky and ingenious…
and unfortunately, most of it is just as obvious. The book’s title even fits
the pattern of Van Dine’s titles: The
[Six Letter Word] Murder Case. It’s a tricky, complex, and delightful read,
and it’s pretty well written too… it just doesn’t get that extra push of
ingenuity to make it a classic like The
Tokyo Zodiac Murders.

Notes:
Unfortunately, the publisher seems to have missed out on the whole
this-is-a-puzzle-mystery thing. The reviews they choose to quote describe the
book in distinctly modern terms: “chilling”, “kinky”, a tale of voyeurism “down
the charred streets of bombed-out Tokyo” involving “sexual obsession and
perversity”. One review even calls the locked-room mystery one that will outdo
John Dickinson
Carr!!! The truth is, this is an excellent fair-play puzzle mystery that should
be enjoyed by fans of the Golden Age mystery despite its flaws. Don’t be fooled
by the rather off-putting reviews.

Patrick
Ohl is a 20-year old Canadian crime fiction aficionado who enjoys hobbies such
as taxidermy and runs a dilapidated motel in the middle of nowhere alongside
his crazed mother. He enjoys relaxing in his subterranean evil lair while
watching his favourite hockey team, the Toronto Maple Leafs, and will
occasionally make chicken chow mein to die for. His life is accompanied by a
soundtrack composed by John Williams, and James Earl Jones provides occasional
voice-overs.

Kevin's Corner

Sandi's Cancer Fight Is Over

Thank you for your prayers, thoughts, and support for the past six years plus as Sandi did everything she could to be here with all of us. She is now free and not hurting anymore. I am still trying to pay off her past treatments at Medical City Dallas Hospital as well as at Texas Oncology. While the hospital can't handle direct donations, if you can help and would prefer to donate directly, please contact Debra, the financial counselor at TEXAS ONCOLOGY in SUITE 220 of Building D at Medical City Dallas Hospital in Dallas, Texas. We thank you for your prayers, thoughts, and support for the past six years plus as Sandi did everything she could to be here with all of us.